Turkey tonight recalled its ambassador to the US after a House of Representatives committee approved a resolution describing the massacre of more than a million Armenians by the Ottoman empire during the first world war as genocide.

The non-binding measure passed despite objections from the Obama administration, which had warned the house foreign affairs committee it would harm relations with Turkey – a Nato ally with about 1,700 troops in Afghanistan – and could imperil fragile reconciliation talks between Turkey and Armenia.

Turkish President Abdullah Gul called the resolution "an injustice to history and to the science of history."

However, Armenia applauded the passage of the measure, which its foreign minister, Edward Nalbandian, described as "an important step towards the prevention of crimes against humanity". He added: "This is further proof of the devotion of the American people to universal human values and is an important step towards the prevention of crimes against humanity."

It remained unclear whether the resolution will come to a vote in the full house. A similar 2007 resolution died after intense lobbying by the Bush administration, amid fears it would damage relations between Turkey and the US. Historians say that 1.5 million Armenians were killed by the Ottoman empire between 1915 and 1923, during a forced resettlement. "The overwhelming historical evidence demonstrates that what took place in 1915 was genocide," writes Henri Barkey, a Turkey scholar at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington DC, who nevertheless opposes the house resolution as a needless political manoeuvre.

The killings are considered one of the first instances of genocide in the 20th century. Turkey insists its historical records indicate no genocide took place, but points to a lack of common historical understanding over the events.

After centuries of foreign domination, Armenia won independence from the Soviet Union in 1991.

Under Swiss auspices, Turkey and Armenia have been negotiating a normalisation of bilateral relations and an opening of the border, outcomes which are strongly favoured by the US.

The house resolution is the product of intensive lobbying by Armenian-Americans. Last year the Armenian national committee of America spent $50,000 (£33,000) lobbying Congress on the resolution, which urged Barack Obama to characterise the events as genocide in an annual message commemorating the massacres.

During the presidential campaign, he referred to the killings as genocide, but did not used the term last year in a statement recognising Armenian remembrance day, which commemorates the massacres

On Wednesday, Secretary of state Hillary Clinton had called a senior Democrat Congressman, Howard Berman, to warn that the resolution could hurt US-Turkey relations.